Why Should We Use the Term Epidemic with HIV/AIDS?

Why Should We Use the Term Epidemic with HIV/AIDS? (0:40)

HIV/AIDS is an epidemic because of the high rate of infection, says HealthMaker Sean Strub, activist and founder of POZ Magazine. In this video he says that there's about 50,000 new cases per year, and most people are willing to just accept that.

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Larry Kramer would argue we should be using the term pandemic or plague. First of, it is an epidemic, there are still people acquiring the disease at an enormous fast rate, it may be manageable, you can have an epidemic of a manageable disease, but the public and political will to address the epidemic has kind of drifted away and there seems to be a willingness to accept about 50, 000 new infections a year, which is where we've been stuck at for 10 years.